My sympathies for your loss. But you have no way of knowing how mom contracted covid. The infected person could have been masked, but it was a thin homemade mask of little value. Or, perhaps it was a new N95, but the person was wearing it incorrectly…(which many people do).
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Oh but we do. Someone that came to her house to provide a service. 3 days later tested positive. 3 days AFTER that told MIL she was positive. It was too late by then to do anything.
The man that came to take her body–service not the funeral home–said they can’t keep up, way too many bodies. He had just picked up an infant. Said the news nets should be interviewing him because it is so so terrible.
My neighbor and I said about the same thing. We have gotten use to be more anonymous and I have found that the face mask keeps me warmer in the cold weather. 
@NYMom122 - I hope you realize that I wasn’t being flippant about your post. I was replying upstream. My sincere sympathies. We have been struggling to find in home care for my 93 year old mother in law for similar reasons. Why would health care workers working with some of the most vulnerable not be vaccinated? It just blows my mind.
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I am sorry for your loss, but it is quite likely that 5 year olds being masked at school would not have saved her. In fact, their actions likely had little to no impact upon her, which is why under 12s were not masked in schools in Europe mostly.
It sounds like she was highly vulnerable due to advanced age. That is very sad, of course, and is the case for many contagious diseases which adversely impact the elderly disproportionately. Very hard to remain in a bubble at home and have no interaction with anyone. Some highly vulnerable may try to do that and some may find that price to high to pay.
In any event, I agree with our Secretary of Education. Children have suffered enough over the last 2 years( and may have to do so again if another variant occurs).
In even the bluest of states, mask mandates are expiring. Children should not be asked to do more than the rest of us to protect the highly vulnerable.
I was serious when I pointed out that your child can continue masking, and you can control her attendance, and limit her activity with others. You can only control what is within your grasp and act accordingly. That may mean pulling her from your existing school, or not allowing anyone into your house for any reason, or giving a mask and a covid test to anyone who provides service to you. You should implement whatever restrictions on your family you feel needed.
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Saw this in the “Fact Check” side of my Google news. Turns out it’s true.
No surprise really, but certainly helpful when contemplating risk as we (fully vaxxed and boosted) head out.
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@my3girls I’m not interested in a debate over what developmental issues have been proven to be impacted by mask wearing in young children. I work in elementary education and I can assure you there has been well documented learning loss in our youngest learners. I’m sure all pandemic related circumstances have contributed to that learning loss.
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Interesting. The booster rate in the US is pretty low - 40% as of late January - and the data suggests that the original vaccine series still does a remarkable job at preventing death from Covid. Consider that .7/100,000 (the death rate of those who are “fully vaccinated” but w/o the booster) is only .0007%! So yes, while that’s 7x higher than the death rate of the boosted, it’s still an incredibly low number. In fact, some experts say that the recent CDC numbers don’t justify a universal rollout of the booster shots, as summarized in this NYT piece: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/04/health/covid-boosters-older-younger.html
"Still, several recent studies have found that vaccination alone, without boosters, remained strongly protective against severe illness and death in most people, even after Omicron’s appearance.
‘I do not think these data support a universal booster rollout for everyone,’ said Dr. Celine Gounder, an infectious disease expert and epidemiologist at Kaiser Health News.
Instead, boosters seem most essential for older adults, she said, and those who have certain immune conditions or live in long-term care facilities. In younger Americans, it may have made sense to make booster shots available only to those with certain medical risks, she said."
Still, as the CDC data is only through the end of December, it doesn’t capture the full impact of Omicron. Updated data might show a more beneficial result for younger and/or overall healthier populations from the booster.
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I will be curious as to how test scores will pan out as these children grow into their testing years. I am pretty sure the time students spent in remote learning situations will prove to lead to lower scores. The question that will be asked is what could we have done differently? I can’t even begin to even have an opinion on that.
Fortunately there is a big cohort of children whose schools never went remote. Their scores should be just fine.
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Many schools are using ESSER funds from the American Rescue Plan to provide intervention services for students who have fallen behind academically. Some schools are implementing fabulous programs. Social and emotional developmental delays have also been prominent in many classrooms. Kids don’t know how to be good classroom citizens. Student behavior has become a major issue. These issues are not captured by a test. Only time will tell how many ways “pandemic” learning has impacted our children. I’m hopeful that many will catch up.
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My sister is swamped right now, but as soon as she has more time I will ask her opinion about how kids are doing. She is an elementary special ed / literacy teacher. She has 35 years of experience and more certifications than probably 99% of anyone in the country. She trains other teachers. She is now teaching at the Texas School for the Blind - most of her students have some eyesight. I think she has only one student who has to use Braille. I know she has been incredibly stressed the last couple of years. The TSB students come from all over the state and usually live on campus in Austin. Working with them remotely was not good. 
Plus there is no socialization. Sitting far apart in class rooms and lunch rooms. It’s isolation at very tender ages where that’s one of the things you learn.
Most comments I’ve read on other sites from K-elementary school teachers are that kids are 2 years behind developmentally. A fourth grader acts like 2nd grader. They have fear of strangers. That an incoming kindergartener who might take 4 weeks to settle into a new classroom situation now takes at least 9 weeks which is an entire semester.
One interview had a mother who said when her kindergarten child was supposed to draw a picture of herself as an assignment just drew eyes and hair. No mouth or nose.
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That’s not what I am seeing with regard to masks and social distancing. I see kids running around outside playing with each other just like they always did. Only with masks on. Outside at least, I am not in their classrooms.
Distance learning is another matter. Parents tell me it was horrible at first and definitely at best adequate after they got all the kinks out. It was a huge stress as nearly everyone around here has two working parents. Lots of community groups and the schools themselves are providing all sorts of summer programs and after school programs to catch the kids up.
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San Diego County has confirmed that when the state-wide indoor mask mandate expires Feb. 15, the county will not institute its own masking order, which is not surprising. Early in the pandemic, San Diego was early to order indoor masking, even before the original state-wide mandate, but San Diego was among the counties that chose not to issue a mask order during the Delta surge.
During this latest statewide masking mandate, I’ve noticed an interesting phenomenon. I’m seeing affluent looking moms with school age children in places like Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s, all without masks. It stands out because masking compliance is generally high in my area, and because that was not the typical demographic of the maskless during the original order. I kind of wonder if it’s due to a generalized anger about how the state has handled schooling during the pandemic, including the continued masking in school. I’m probably reading too much into it.
California will soon issue new guidance for school masking. Having a HS student myself, I’m eagerly awaiting that guidance, as well as what the local school districts and individual private schools decide to do with it.
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Me as well, but I thought of the following article when I read this paragraph. Tend not to read Substack but this one caught my eye - in part because I had erroneously assumed that the subject moms were on the other side of the debate. There have been a few articles by and about moms lately - the recent Atlantic article, also attached, is another example.
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It’s so regional as to perceptions. Masks as far as I know were never needed outside from the onset. Where I live nobody wears a mask unless they want to (and I’ve never heard anyone give anyone grief for doing so–you do you). Our schools are open and have been for a long time with no problems. All I can say is people need to look at a broad picture of the situation.
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Every momma bear opens her eyes at one point eventually to see how the cubs are doing even if they’ve been hibernating a bit too long.
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And I was responding to a post about mask wearing not learning loss. Don’t know why you replied to me. There is no evidence that mask wearing is causing developmental issues. There is evidence that living through a global pandemic with the resulting school disruption has caused learning loss. Totally different things in my opinion.
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The WHO and the governments of Europe disagree with you; they believe the mask wearing among young children is detrimental and thus not recommended.
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I replied to you because your post #7435 was a direct reply to my comment. I thought it was the polite thing to do.
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